About me: I am EXTREMELY extroverted. If you are familiar with the Myers-Brigg test, you will understand when I say that I score 100% E every time. I could be around people almost all the time. I hardly feel like I have finished doing something until I tell someone all about it. My ideal living arrangement would probably be kind of communal. Maybe separate suites for families with a big common living area and kitchen and garden and outdoor space. I have lots of good friends, locally, but (kind of strange to me) these folks like to spend lots of time doing solitary kinds of activities. My boyfriend lives with me, but he spends long hours at work and needs alone time sometimes at home.
About our world: I think that people are kind of isolated in the modern, suburban world. We live in our separate houses, mostly inside and away from other families. People usually work away from their home and community. Most people don't live within spitting distance of their extended families and dearest friends. We schedule time to see those we like, but we don't spontaneously meet up with friends and relatives in the course of the day. This works fine for some people, but it doesn't work for me.
Fast forward to having a baby and staying at home, and all those things became a recipe for loneliness. It was hard giving up going out into the adult world every day and interacting with people. Since I returned to work and to school, I have been much happier over-all. But this semester, I am working very little and out of school again, and I feel isolated during much of the day.
This is where Twitter and Facebook and Blogging have made such a difference for me. They feel like a common room, where I wander in, hear what people are talking about, join in some of the conversations, get to know people spontaneously, feel surrounded by personalities. Whenever I happen to have time to be on the internet, there is always someone else, someone I share values and interests with, looking for conversation and connection too.
I would rather that my Twitter buddies, Facebook friends, and bloggers I read all move to Atlanta, live right here in my neighborhood, and have frequent block parties and chats over coffee, but I am grateful to Al Gore (cause he invented the internet) for the online connection I can have with these people.
I don't know why other people use these social networks, but I would be interested in hearing whether my experience with them is the norm.
